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UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 18, 2018

David Beaty

Lawrence, Kansas

COACH BEATY: It's going to be a nice, near-perfect day out there, about 100 percent humidity. It should be fun practicing with our guys. We enjoyed Saturday. It was very similar to that.

Pleased with the win. Happy for our fans, happy for our players. We felt like we left a lot out there. As we watched the video it confirmed that, that we did. We left a lot of stuff out there that you simply can't do in the Big 12.

So we learned a lot from that tape. It's never as good as you think it is and never as bad as you think it is but we learned a whole lot from that tape.

I think the biggest thing is just knowing that there's just a few little things, if we can fix them then we've got a chance to be even more productive than we were at times on Saturday.

Still impressed with our defense creating turnovers. Still impressed with their mentality, impressed with those guys getting off the field in the first drive of each half with three-and-outs. I think we had 5 three-and-outs in their 15 drives. So a third of their drives were three-and-outs, which is something that you shoot for.

Forced some turnovers. It's been big for us. Obviously, continuing to do that is going to be critical. One of the biggest differences for us right now is really the turnover margin from a year ago and then really competing to win the battle of the hidden yards in the kicking game. So I thought we had some rough spots in the kicking game the other day that those simply can't happen. They just can't happen.

The one good thing was that we were able to get together at halftime and really kind of made some adjustments that helped us get settled back down. And I thought we came out and played a pretty clean game in the second half, even when we used a different kicker and a different holder through the remainder of the game last week.

So, there were some things that we can build off of but certainly some things that we were not proud of in that game. We can't have that stuff happen.

The running game continues to develop, which is something that we're going to have to continue to do. People know we want to run the ball. We've been able to run the ball pretty good over the last couple of weeks.

So, I mean, it's no secret what people are going to be working on and how they're going to -- what they're going to be doing to try to stop it. It's something that we're going to have to solve as we show up each week.

But having a plan for it and understanding it's really more about us and our execution is critical. I still think -- and I'll finish with this before we take questions -- I still think that one of the biggest things we can do to help our team is to be better on first down on both sides of the ball.

We've seen some improvement particularly on defense. And really on the offensive side as well because that helps us on that third down situation. We still have to be much better on third down offensively for sure, but we'd like to see those numbers go way up because we're certainly going to need it against the high-powered offenses in our conference. Questions.

Q. Baylor has a few really long, really explosive wide receivers. Where is Corione Harris on his development and is he ready for this? And (indiscernible) he looking forward to this challenge?
COACH BEATY: I'll tell you it on the head when you talk about the guys they have. They have the Jalen Hurd kid who transferred from Tennessee. He was a running back. But he doesn't -- he's reshaped his body. I think he's lost 20, 25 pounds, certainly looks like a wide receiver now. Has really worked on his craft. Possesses a lot of skill, a lot of skill. They hand him the ball off in the backfield a couple times and he can still certainly do that. He's got terrific vision.

I really like the Mims kid. I think Mims is, I think he might be the best receiver in the league and there's a bunch of good ones in this league.

I mean, it was amazing when we were voting for all-conference teams last year, and I was sitting down looking at all the people that were really deserving of that. And I mean the numbers ran into 15 or so of guys in this league. This league is full of terrific receivers. And it's hard to choose one.

But Mims stands out to me. He's a playmaker. He's big. He's fast. He makes plays. I think he's got perfect size, good length. I know he didn't play last week, but competitors like that, you know they get well. He'll be out there Saturday, I'm sure.

Chris Platt played for a guy that coached for me. And this kid has been around forever. I love him because I know him pretty well. And I hope that he has a great career after this. But I was hoping he'd graduate and move on. But he's still there.

And he's a track guy that can really run and I've listened to Matt talk a lot about how unselfish he is. And I think that our hands are going to be full with whether it's Corione or anybody, we're going to have to do a good job of managing these guys.

And they have the ability to make a big play at any time, but we're going to have to prepare well this week because I'm not sure we've seen a group of guys like this put together. This is a pretty strong group of wideouts.

Q. Do you have an update on Daniel at all? Hurt his knee and didn't play much?
COACH BEATY: You know, he didn't play a whole lot in the second half but fortunately it was not severe at all. He's good to go. He'll be back at practice today and tomorrow. He was more of a precautionary deal. And it wasn't his knee. I'm not going to speak on what it was. But it wasn't his knee area.

Q. How much credit does Clint Bowen deserve for your defensive turnaround?
COACH BEATY: He deserves a ton. And I've talked about it for a long, long time how much I believe in this guy, how hard he works, how smart he is, how much those kids believe in him, how he gets the best out of players and just his resiliency. He's a guy that really helped me over these last three to four years with his steady approach he's a guy that motivates you and inspires you as you come in to work each day. That's what it's like for the staff of the leadership. Meets us the same way, so is Kenny Perry. So all those guys -- those guys deserve the credit. They're the ones that are building the plans and they're the ones that are passing it down to our assistant coaches doing a good job of passing it on to the kids.

So hopefully we can continue to do that.

Q. "D" line and safety, seems a lot of the JUCO recruits added to your depth. They must be quick learners to play right away. Did you try to go for guys, smart guys?
COACH BEATY: We brought in a number of guys that came from junior college programs. Now, a lot of those guys were three-plus-year eligibility guys which meant they were qualifiers.

So what a qualifier tells you is that he qualified to be able to go to a Division I school out of high school. And that tells us that he has some academic prowess, that he has the background to be successful in college already.

And that's one of the things we were looking forward to trying to get, plus being able to maximize the years for each initial. But one of the things we did is we had a very detailed approach about what we were looking for in those guys. And one of the things was their aptitude and their ability to digest things.

And the other thing is just knowing that it doesn't matter if you're a junior college guy or a freshman, we've got to do a good job of making sure that we can make them understand it and we're not trying to do too much so they can play fast.

Q. Is the two quarterback system kind of working the way you anticipated right now, and what improvements have you seen Peyton and Miles this season starting?
COACH BEATY: So far so good. It's really been right along the line of what we had planned. We'll continue to tweak that plan if we need to. But Peyton will get the start again this week. He's a guy that brings a certain skill set to the table that helps us in his role and then the same thing with Miles. Miles has done a nice job developing as he's come in.

There were some things early on, heading out of fall camp, that he just needed some game time to get better at before he was able to play a lot in the game.

And he's really continuing to develop. You can see him start to get a lot more comfortable there and that's really been the plan. The plan isn't going to change for us. We have an idea how we want to approach it and we'll start Peyton and might be for one play might be for 50 plays. We'll see how it goes.

Q. Speak to the advantage of bringing Miles for a full series as opposed to one or two plays?
COACH BEATY: I think rhythm for a guy matters. And I also think making sure you're not becoming to a point where people kind of have an idea what you're doing I think initially people would probably look at Miles and say when they want to run the ball they'll bring Miles in.

We as an offense have to know that. And he also -- we looked long and hard all throughout the country for a guy that could run the football but he to be able to throw the football equally as well and Miles can do that.

So one of the things we hope that all of our self-scout stuff is telling people is that, man, it's going to be hard to load the box on him because he can throw it. Hopefully we can get him to that point.

Q. Obviously you used Miles a lot more this past weekend. As you guys were prepping this week, have you involved him more and more as the season progresses just to get him game ready or has that changed at all?
COACH BEATY: You know, the plan initially -- and I think I shared it with you guys but don't quote me on it, I can't remember if I did -- but our plan was play Miles in every game for sure. I wanted to make sure I was forthcoming in that.

But the thing for us is it's very specifically based on our opponent. What gives us a schematic advantage in terms of what they do. And then how and which way do each one of those guys fit into the game plan and then there's some things where his skill set or his body of plays that we have him running that week are things that we wanted to stay with at that time.

So, fortunately, it went pretty well with him the other day. We were able to play him a lot more.

Q. You talked about the run game, people are going to commit to the run with you guys. How important is it going to make it for the quarterback -- you had a lot of RPOs and stuff to make the right reads, make right decisions, give yourself an advantage?
COACH BEATY: I think I've said it over and over again. For you to be great in the passing game you have to be able to run the football. You've got to be able to be more than just one-dimensional. And we've got to be able to get the run game going to help our protection. That in turn helps the quarterback stay on his feet, in turn gives him time to get his eyes downfield, to be able to go through read A, B, C, give him ample time to sit in the pocket and make a routine throw instead of having to run for his life a bunch. Being very smart how we manage the series is kind of critical as well. But that run game, I've always said I've been around teams that, if you can run it, it gives you an advantage.

So, we've got to find a way to continue to do well in the run game and continue to produce on the ground. That's where some of our best players lie. But it also really is the key that opens up everything else.

Q. You guys are coming off back-to-back big wins. You have two players on the basketball team tweeting about you guys. Do you sense the heightened buzz around the program right now?
COACH BEATY: You know, I live in this building. There's times when I drive out of my driveway and we're supposed to be heading to Menard's or something and my car goes to this building. So I don't go very many places other than here.

I probably would not be the best one to ask. Our players would probably be the best ones to ask. We tend to keep our head down, and I don't mean that to be disrespectful, I just know that there's a buzz around our facility from our players. But I'm just not out and about enough to tell you that. I think our players could tell you a lot more than I could.

Q. Essentially the two offensive lines, the middle three, can you continue to do that or are you looking for something from each of those groups, or is that still -- can you still play multiple guys across that line?
COACH BEATY: We hope we can. We hope they keep developing. We've had years in the past where we've lost an offensive linemen and the other guys have not played until it was their turn to come in and it cost you a game, completely.

Then the season can kind of take a bad turn. So being able to get that development in those first three games is going to be critical. So far I feel like we've got eight or nine guys that we think could help us. We do think that there's still a clear line between the guys that will be starting and the guys that are not. But that line is getting closer.

That competition is getting heavy, and some of them guys that haven't played a whole lot are starting to become better players. And I think it's only going to help us because it makes us better all the way around because of the competition involved.

Q. Are you able to put the Williams thing behind you, the eligibility thing?
COACH BEATY: He's available. So as far as I'm concerned, we just basically work on the next game and right now. So he'll be playing Saturday. As far as I'm concerned it's behind me until somebody tells me different.

Q. Azur Kamara dropped a pick --
COACH BEATY: He knocked it down. He got a knock-down. (Laughter). He batted it down.

Q. Do you like how he's coming along?
COACH BEATY: I do. I think just for me watching him in that second game, I actually noticed him. In the first game I don't know that I noticed him as much. And then watching him in the last game, I started to notice him more. He's a guy that got here late in the summer and that hurts your development a little bit. But I think he's added 10 or 12 pounds, something like that, already. And he's a guy that really we need him to come on for us.

He was close -- he got some hurries and he got close to the quarterback the other day, which is good. But he's a guy that, I mean, I would have loved to see him make that play, I bet he doesn't miss that again if he has that opportunity. I know he wants it back. But he's a very talented guy and I can see him improving week-to-week. Hopefully he'll continue that process.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

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